Spacious Skies: Old Works

Today as some are enjoying a quiet, relaxing day after Christmas, my industrious husband is cleaning out our garage. A box of my old art work has been sitting out there, neglected and falling prey to dust, mildew, and spiders (the main reason I have put off taking care of it). But today turned out to be the day to open the box, and realize that everything inside is still in pretty good shape. And I found some long forgotten work I'd done that looks pretty good! Here are three watercolors I found today. I see that my love of big horizons is on display in these sketches, something that comes from growing up on the prairie.

These muted scenes are a nice reminder of my ongoing love affair with watercolor and lonely, muted landscapes.

Scenes from the Coast

This summer, my family and I have been spending a lot of time at the beach. Here are a few sketches from the beach that I'm going to put into a small booklet. This will be the cover page. We always find a lot of sand dollars on the beach.

I sat on the beach and did this little watercolor. While I was working, the pelicans came and were swooping down to catch fish. It was a fantastic sight to see! In fact, I was afraid to try drawing the birds in, but then I did it, and realized a quick gesture was all I needed to do.

I'm always drawn to the interesting, organic shapes of the seaweed that washes up on shore.

A favorite activity of ours, especially with visitors, is to climb the local lighthouse.

It was fun to practice my watercolor and drawing this way! I need to do this more often.

Collage First Attempt

Last spring, I had the opportunity to teach a lesson on making collages in my son's 4th grade class. I was so inspired during the lesson, watching the children's enthusiasm as they made their collages, that I came home and immediately made some collages. Here are two of my first collages.

In this abstract collage, I used a combination of paper and fabric, combining images and text with visual and tactile texture. To emphasize linear elements in the composition, I added some black yarn. My second attempt below is a more recognizable abstract landscape composition. I layered tissue paper along with a combination of fabric and plain paper.